Corporate Integrity Project

NLPC seeks to promote integrity in corporate governance, including honesty and fair play in relationships with shareholders, employees, business partners and customers. In doing so, NLPC places special emphasis on:

* Asserting that the social responsibility of the corporation is to defend and advance the interests of the people who own the company, the shareholders. True responsibility is fidelity to one’s own mission, not someone else’s, or someone else’s political agenda.

* Exposing the seeking of influence on public officials by corporations, which is the inevitable result of high levels of government spending and intervention in the marketplace.

* Combating practices that undermine the free enterprise system, including philanthropic giving to groups hostile to a free economy.

Twitter and CEO Jack Dorsey have come under criticism on this Web site and others over past efforts to censorconservatives, but in the high-profile case this week with provocateur Alex Jones and his organization Infowars, Twitter didn’t go along with the mob (Apple, Facebook, Google/YouTube, Pinterest and Spotify) and boot him from their social media platform.

It doesn’t appear that Twitter has necessarily seen the light, as it still shadow bans conservatives (a charge that Dorsey has denied), but the CEO’s explanation for not taking out Infowars articulated principles that the other tech companies should heed.

Saying that Infowars “hasn’t violated our rules” and that Twitter “wouldn’t succumb and simply react to outside pressure” (like the group thinkers at Facebook, YouTube, etc. obviously did), Dorsey then put the onus for holding Jones and company accountable on others.

Last week Google apparently reversed course on availability its powerful search engine, which based on “principle” had withdrawn from China in 2010, after it refused to comply with the government’s wishes for it to self-censor content sensitive to its freedom-hating leaders. Now, under a program called “Dragonfly,” Google is said to be developing a version of its search engine that would comply with Chinese demands.

Search is where Google generates huge profits, and missing out on the massive market in Asia clearly bugs them in Silicon Valley.

“Google is waking up to smell the coffee,” said Andy Mok, founder and president of Beijing-based consultancy … Read More ➡

It has been reported that the idea of former CEO Howard Schultz running as a Democrat for the presidency is giving Starbucks investors, financial analysts, and company officials cause for concern.

It’s apparently not far-fetched. When he finally announced his long-anticipated departure from the company on June 26, Schultz told employees he would think “about a range of options for myself, from philanthropy to public service, but I’m a long way from knowing what the future holds.”

According to Politico, a person (whose identity was not disclosed by the site) close to the company’s current leaders said, “They don’t want him, as a retired founder, running for office. It’s a huge headache.”

Should it be difficult to believe that those who are responsible for the company bottom line would dread at least a two-year campaign by Schultz, which would link Starbucks with the Democratic Party … Read More ➡

Now we have another reason why corporations should welcome – and even seek – ideological diversity among their employees.

Because now the workers are telling their bosses who they can and cannot do business with.

In this case it is a number of companies in the largely leftist Silicon Valley tech industry, where many of the rank-and-file – who have been encouraged to speak their minds (if they are liberal, that is) – are complaining that the fruits of their labor benefit what they view as the odious U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and yes, the despicable Trump administration.

The employees’ outcry has been over the “inhumane” separation of illegal immigrant children from the adults they came to the U.S. border with, despite the fact that many – if not most – arrived with criminals, traffickers, or illegitimate asylum seekers who are … Read More ➡

Of course the major technology companies based in Silicon Valley – who almost unanimously have advocated for open borders policies that come with unlimited visas for the foreign workers they want to employ – have joined the chorus.

Apple CEO Tim Cook reacted, while in Dublin, to the widespread pictures of immigrant children housed in facilities away from their detained parents.

“It’s heartbreaking to see the images and hear the sounds of the kids,” he said. “Kids are the most vulnerable people in any society. I think that what’s happening is inhumane, it needs to stop. I’m personally a big believer in the way to be a good citizen is to participate, … Read More ➡

Apple again has taken a step it says will strengthen privacy for its millions of product users, but the heightened encryption measure has drawn criticism from law enforcement who want the ability to “crack” phones of suspects in search of information during criminal investigations.

And once again a decision by the company has called attention to the inconsistencies of its policies in free countries, as opposed to China.

The measure, announced Wednesday, would alter the settings on the iPhone to severely curb the ability of police to communicate with the devices via external “hacking” instruments. Previously law enforcement could connect and access the iPhones’ data in an unlimited fashion in search of accessibility passwords. Under the new update, the phones will lock out all attempts at access after an hour.

“If we go back to the situation where we again don’t have access, now we know directly all … Read More ➡

Last week comedienne-actress Roseanne Barr managed to get herself fired by ABC from her rebooted TV sitcom following her highly unflattering tweet about the facial features of Valerie Jarrett (in photo), longtime political consigliere to Barack Obama. Roseanne’s words were clearly over the line. But despite issuing a profuse apology, she’s now eternally marked as a “racist.” The saddest thing about all this was that Jarrett was portrayed to be a victim.

Roseanne Barr, now 65, a native of Salt Lake City, made her initial reputation during the Eighties as a stand-up comedienne. Her schtick suggested manic depression with a dose of laughing gas. In 1988 she snagged a television deal with ABC in which she would star in her own situation comedy as a “working-class domestic goddess.” The show, Roseanne, instantly caught fire. She would win an Emmy, a Golden Globe and other awards during its nine-year … Read More ➡

Never before in the history of corporate America has a company so welcomed accusations of racism as Starbucks. But that could have been expected given the worldview of Executive Chairman Howard Schultz.

Several weeks ago, Schultz announced that on May 29 he would close around 8,000 of the company’s outlets to train employees on how to recognize and avoid unconscious social bias. This was in response to the publicized arrest on April 18 of two black males at a Starbucks coffee shop in Philadelphia. Whatever his ulterior motives, he and other company executives should avoid this route. The training is guaranteed to be expensive. And it will backfire.

Corporate executives today know that to keep their jobs and avoid boycotts they must persuade employees to shed supposedly unconscious race and gender biases lurking within their souls. And though the remedy, known universally as “diversity,” promotes … Read More ➡

The term “corporate diversity” these days refers far less to a diversity of opinion than to a diversity of demography in which people submit to rigid codes of speech and behavior if they want to stay employed.

Of the many companies enforcing this regime, Starbucks has been especially zealous. On April 18, 2018, Starbucks Executive Chairman Howard Schultz announced that sometime in May he would close about 8,000 of its coffee shops for an afternoon to train employees on how to recognize and avoid “unconscious bias.” His statement was in response to the highly-publicized arrest of two black males at a Philadelphia store.

For the last few decades, and with increasing speed, major corporations in this country are incorporating racial, ethnic and gender radicalism into their business practices. Whether out of fear or conviction, officials now reflexively succumb to Leftist campaigns that target them for injustices against minority groups.

On the surface, it looks like a compromise. Underneath, it is a capitulation. Yesterday the National Football League and its 32 team owners announced the establishment of a new policy on the issue of player ‘kneel-downs’ during the playing of the national anthem to express solidarity with Black Lives Matter and other radical groups who see America as the land of racial injustice. While the policy nominally bars players from kneeling down on the sidelines and gives owners the latitude to levy fines against violators, it also allows players to protest by remaining in their locker rooms. This is not a resolution. Indeed, it is a guarantee of further political melodrama.

Last November 29, as National Legal and Policy Center discussed at length days later, the National Football League and the NFL Players Association reached an agreement over this issue to ward off controversy. The league would provide $89 million … Read More ➡